Effective Social Media Marketing for Entrepreneurs

A very interesting Concall on empowering Social Media by Laura Roeder and Tim Conley. On their Call they touch several very important yet very rarly discussed issues that attached to Social Media. Naming just a few of these, the most important things almost everyone faces using social media, especially facebook are:

“When ever I open Facebook, I spend a lot of Time reading Blogposts and looking at Images and Videos?”

“I don’t engange into conversations, since that could be promatic for my Business?”

“I have now clue how to bring in my Business-side without getting into my friends face?

“What is the tone I use for talking about business?”

“Where do I talk privately, where is business Zone?”

“How do I start getting into conversations at all?”

“What do I do in order to interact with people on twitter?”

“I’m afraid of Spamming my followers and friends if I do tweet to much

The current twitter worldmap. There are people that you can market to.

Additionally to these, very interesting questions, some research on how start-Up websits, namely blogs or saas services, do interact effectivly with their readerbase. For many Entreneurs, the biggest issue is that they do not even have a readerbase. Starting a readerbase today might be slightly easier, but still requires significant effort.

Be Likeable.

It might sound a bit plain, yet, social media works like going to a blind date. Since you increase your change of making a good first impression, you might consider to shower before going out. The same is true for every sales representative.

Generally it is favorable that you are presenting your Startup, Yourself or your Product in a favorable way.

Definitly it is good to start out directly, instead of waiting for the perfect “style”, yet one of my goals is to step by step getting all these assets set up well:

When going out you to the Social Media Party, you might want to:

Brush clean and polish your business mission-statement and core values

Clean up the Homepage and check if all Links are working

Refresh your Facebook Profile Image from Time to Time

Enhance your Twitterbackground or Change it

Getting your All-Over Look and Feel Up to make a good fit.

Keep in Mind that fit is refering to your readers not just to yourself

1. “When ever I open Facebook, I spend a lot of Time reading Blogposts and looking at Images and Videos?”

Laura Roeder brings up a very good Point: she indicates that most people stay within their own radius and do not get out of their comfort zone. Therefor it is impossible to market. Marketing always has the goal of reaching with a message to people that were not yet aware about this specific information.

In short: Marketing is News. If it is not news and you do not interact with people bringing them a new gospel, there is no point to that action.

Please find below the Action-Checklist for your VA.

2. “I don’t engange into conversations, since that could be promatic for my Business?”

Very good point. The short from the interview answer is: right:

Use your Facebook Profile for personal posting

Use your Fanpage, Twitteraccount, Tumbleblog or IRC Profile for Business purpose

3. “I have now clue how to bring in my Business-side without getting into my friends face?

Laura makes a very smart, yet precise and easy to use point here: talk like you were skype-text chatting with a friend.

Use a direct, straight and useful tone to get your message across swift.

Don’t brag around using marketing buzzwords, or you will be a bore.

4. “What is the tone I use for talking about business?”

Bring your personal perspective. Talk about the good and the everyday things. Talk about them in an official yet easy to grasp way.

5. “Where do I talk privately, where is business Zone?”

As mentioned in point 2, the strategy here is very clear: Keep your private life to your friends. Facebook limits your friends to 5.000, once you are there, you are screwd. Therefor: Market using your Fanpages and Twitterprofiles, not your personal facebook account

6. “How do I start getting into conversations at all?”

Similar to how you would do it on a real party. Find people you like to talk to, that you can relate to and that are on a similar level as you are. It might be hard to get into a conversation with the twitter top100, but its pretty easy to involve people that are into the same topics, same ideologies and similar lifestyle as you are.

7. “What do I do in order to interact with people on twitter?”

Find their profiles, comment on their tweets, send them a mention if you got something interesting for them.

8. “I’m afraid of Spamming my followers and friends if I do tweet to much

That is really not necessary. As long as you come up with new information or new aspects to a given information, thats fine. Be sure to only market where expected: Twitter, Facebook-Pages, Tumbler or in Blogs. Avoid Marketing in private context. Laura made an interesting Comment on Twitter: she considers Twitter to be a RSS Reader for many people. Since people don’t permanenty use twitter, be sure to broadcast your message on just once, if its important.